May 28th - Poem #7 - Michael O'Leary

For my father in prison, 1965

Doing time

                        my father would have needed time to do this

To build a table

                        made from matchsticks, our only family heirloom

Matchstick upon

matchstick held together with some kind of glue

Just like the

                        brick building which held him

Yes, that’s it

                        stone upon black stone which kept him captive

He entered through

                        the heavy, bolted steel door they held open

And when he emerged

                        he had a matchstick table and was very quiet

Each matchstick

                        represented a fragment of his life

Each fragment

                        was there outside him, set in glue, and he was a shell